Describe a random encounter with a stranger that stuck out positively to you.
Friendship—or even courtship—may start from a random encounter with a stranger. The internet is one channel that opens opportunities for such encounters to develop into long‑term relationships. From exploring to encountering, from encountering to enjoying, from enjoying to exchanging, and then exploring again, people circle the global network seeking new experiences that can shift despair into hope, sadness into happiness, or poverty into wealth.
The Internet is powerful: it transmits information worldwide in a split second. YouTube and similar platforms link people of different nations for various purposes across the globe. Information transmission has changed from a unilateral mode to a much wider, more interactive one. Knowledge that is difficult to put into words—for example, tacit knowledge—is now shared freely online through audio and video tools. Digital phones, for instance, have become indispensable even among the elderly, who once rejected digital devices.
Technology constantly opens new pages in the digital world, creating new opportunities for innovative lifestyles. Advances in technology shift customary experiences into random encounters round the clock. But do many random encounters make life breathless—and where should the line be drawn?
I have had many random yet positive encounters with strangers since I began visiting patients as a volunteer for the hospital’s chaplaincy. Every patient I meet is an unscheduled stranger, and every encounter is positive because I do not treat them as strangers but as friends for whom I care, providing comfort and bringing God‑given peace. In the eyes of the flesh, we call those we do not know “strangers.” But in spiritual vision, we see the invisible and serve strangers with the lovingkindness God bestows on us, so that we can make the invisible visible.
Blessed are the merciful, for they will be shown mercy (Matthew 5:7). The patient I visited this morning thanked me for visiting her, listening to her story, and instilling strength into her heart and mind. I replied with a smile and words of affirmation: it was God she should thank, and to Him she should turn for peace, hope, and strength.
The parable of the Good Samaritan, taught by the Lord Jesus Christ, has stuck out positively to me (Luke 10:25‑37). Though it is a parable, it is also real in life. While technology raises the living conditions of many people, there are still those who need passersby like the Good Samaritan.
✨✨💖 ~
en yan hua fang 